Seminal work and reception
In 2016, having spent six years [21] studying hundreds of academy schools [22] located in the United Kingdom placed into special measures by Ofsted, Laker published How To Turn Around a Failing School. [23] Laker’s paper concluded that Britain's education system was systematically failing and required urgent reform, specifically, the way that academy schools measured performance, implemented governance, and were held accountable by the Department for Education and Ofsted. The Times, [24] The Daily Telegraph, [25] The Independent, [26] The Guardian [27] and The Atlantic [28] positively reviewed Laker’s paper and soon thereafter, Britain’s Conservative government dispatched Neil Carmichael, Chair of the Education Select Committee, to lead a public inquiry into the performance, accountability and governance of academy schools. [29] Laker then published a sequel paper titled The One Type of Leader Who Can Turn Around a Failing School. [30] Laker’s paper concluded that unethical school leaders were frequently rewarded with orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom because Britain's education system encouraged Machiavellianism. Laker's paper received positive reviews from The Times [31] [32] and BBC News, [33] and was consequently debated on Newsnight [34] by Laker, Kirsty Wark and Michael Wilshaw, Chief Inspector of Schools and Head of Ofsted. Britain's Conservative government responded by publishing a white paper [35] [36] and creating new standards of ethics for school leaders to adhere to. [37] One year later, Laker published a threequel paper titled Research: How The Best School Leaders Create Enduring Change, [38] which proposed reforming the way that school leaders were trained. Laker's method to do so, which received endorsement from Columbia University, [39] was positively reviewed by Tim Leunig, Chief Scientific Advisor and Chief Analyst at the Department for Education. [40] Laker was subsequently invited to present his method to the Conservative Party Conference alongside Britain's Minister of State for School Standards, Nick Gibb. [41] Soon thereafter, Gibb created a national qualification for school leaders to obtain. [42] Laker was subsequently honored by Thinkers50, the global ranking of management thinkers, for his seminal contribution to the education sector. [22] [43]
In 2019 Laker published Europe's first empirical study of the four-day workweek. [44] Laker’s paper, co-authored with Thomas Roulet, and titled Will the 4-Day workweek take hold in Europe? garnered critical acclaim from CNBC, [45] The Times, [46] The New York Times, [47] and The New Yorker for accurately foretelling the continent's widespread adoption of shorter working weeks. [48] In 2021, Laker published Too Proud To Lead, a Bloomsbury Publishing [49] title on corporate and political collapses and scandals which received critical receptions from the Daily Telegraph [50] the Financial Times [51] and Sky News. [50]
One year later, Laker established the concept of ‘meeting-free days’ by publishing MIT Sloan Management Review’s most widely-read paper of 2022 [52] titled The Surprising Impact of Meeting-Free Days. Soon thereafter, Laker published a sequel paper in Harvard Business Review which explained how adopting two meeting-free days per week significantly increases organisational productivity and employee engagement. [53] Laker’s papers garnered critical acclaim from Inc, [54] The Wall Street Journal, [55] Time, the Newstatesman, [56] The Atlantic, [57] Fortune, [58] the Financial Times, [59] and Psychology Today. [60] Microsoft subsequently included Laker’s 'meeting-free days' within their annual Future of Work Report. [61] Soon thereafter, SAP implemented meeting-free Fridays [62] while Salesforce adopted a meeting-free week, explaining, [Laker’s] “recent article in Harvard Business Review noted the need to change how we work.” [63]
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